Laura Simon is a native Daytonian and a graduate of Meadowdale High School. To meet her is to know immediately that she is a “people person.” She is high  energy, vivacious, and very warm-hearted. But finding her niche in life was a difficult journey.
After graduating from high school, Laura established a residential and commercial cleaning business, which she ran for 10 years. After a few years, however, she realized that the business, while financially successful, was getting her down. It didn’t suit her personality or her need for a “hands on” relationship with people. So, while maintaining her business, Laura began taking nursing courses at Sinclair Community College because helping people was her passion. For a year and a half she enjoyed her coursework tremendously, but when she began talking clinical nursing courses, which involved dealing with very ill patients, she found that she was not well suited for that type of work. So she ended her pursuit of a nursing career, but continued her cleaning business.
By the time she reached her late 20’s, Laura, now married with a baby daughter, began contemplating her next move. She recalled that as a very young girl she was fascinated with hair styling, and that a baby sitter would often allow her to play stylist with her hair. So she decided to consider hair styling as a career path, and enrolled in Creative Images Institute of Cosmetology, again maintaining her cleaning business. Upon graduating, she finally gave up her business, served her six-month internship with a salon, earned her hair designer license, and continued to work for the salon for two years.
Laura knew that she wanted to open her own salon eventually, but to gain more experience she worked for two years for Regis Salons, first at the Dayton Mall and then in Englewood where she and her family, now including two daughters, lived. In late 2008, she felt the time was right to get serious about her own salon. She went to the library to get information on starting a business and read that SCORE was a great resource. So she contacted Dayton SCORE, made an appointment with counselor Rod Childs, and had a very productive session with him. But, as she recalls: “I got cold feet for a few months, worrying about taking the big step.” Her family and her clients, however, finally talked her into moving forward. So in early May of 2009 she contacted Rod again and began working closely with him. Over the next four months Rod guided Laura through the steps to obtain the necessary licensing, select a name for the salon, form a Limited Liability Company, and set time lines for all the plans leading to start-up.
Simultaneously, Laura and her husband selected a site for her business in Englewood, a site that had been vacant for two years. Interestingly, the site had been a barber shop with an apartment above in which Laura and her family had lived for several years. They knew the owner, of course, and negotiated a lease for the space. They then undertook a major do-it-yourself project of demolishing and rebuilding the space and equipping it as an attractive and efficient salon. They took on significant debt in this process.
In late September of 2009, Laura opened the doors of Fixation Salon. Many of her clientele followed her, and their referrals and general word of mouth led to a good business ramp up. As of early February, 2010, four months after start-up, Laura had paid down much of the debt incurred and was very close to turning a profit.
Laura is very happy that she has finally settled into her perfect career. She enjoys developing strong relationships with her customers, making sure she understands precisely what they want done with their hair, and providing them exceptional service. Her vision is to grow the salon to a four stylist crew and possibly a manicurist within a few years.
She sings the praises of Rod Childs: “He went above and beyond in leading me through the start-up process. In a very nice way he made sure that I stayed on track. He was, and still is, a mentor, a friend, and now also a steady customer!”
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